He saw men divided into three classes: the hopelessly bad; the strictly virtuous; the wavering; the third he will try to redeem.

When he took up his mission, India was cut up into a multitude of little kingdoms reduced to poverty by a series of petty wars between adjoining states. Each community was still further subdivided by its social laws and occupations into rigid class-distinctions. The people, with nothing to hope for in this life, sought consolation in the superstitious doctrine of the transmigration of souls, being completely under the dominion of their priests, who taught them to prepare for a happier state of existence in some other form by a system of liberal payments to the priesthood during this life.

Buddhism was not so much a revolution in existing beliefs, as a new departure from the method of following them. Breaking away from established usage, Buddha proclaimed a universal brotherhood, one that in theory permitted distinctions of caste, but in practice assumed the absolute equality of all men. Salvation came to all through self-denial and charity. It was this doctrine of equality which gave Buddhism so strong a hold on the caste-ridden people of India. Under the Brahmans it was the priest who was the active agent in preparing the way for a happier state. Buddha proclaimed that every man's salvation depended on himself. Purity of conduct, faithfully and persistently practised, was sufficient to raise every one to the highest state of bliss-the Nirvana. Buddhism assures us that everything material is subject to dissolution, and the only escape from this changeability of matter is to free the soul from the passions and frailties of the body, by severe self-denial and the constant practice of charity in the widest sense towards all men and animals. So long as any leaven of the old wicked nature remains, the soul is shifted about by transmigration from one state of being to another, and cannot escape material existence in some form, a degraded being or an animal; but when the evil has been wholly purged out by a long course of self-denial, the soul is set free from all union with the material world, and assumes a condition of unchangeability that may almost be described as nonexistence; for the term which expresses this state, Nirvana, means the annihilation of all thought and feeling, a state of eternal rest-nir expressing negation, and the root va, to breathe, so that the word signifies to be blown out like a candle, or lifelessness. The Buddhist heaven is, in fact, divided into several regions, rising one above the other, each more ethereal. 1. Space unlimited, where life endures twenty thousand ages. 2. That of wisdom unlimited, where life lasts forty thousand ages. 3. That where there is absolutely nothing; life here lasts sixty thousand ages. 4. That where there is neither thought nor non-thought, nothing without even the knowledge that there is nothing; life endures eighty thousand ages, and beyond this, Nirvana, pure nothing-extinction complete. This scale of regions indicates the progressive purification required to attain

the end. "Buddha himself was so penetrated and overcome with the feeling of the infinite, that he was lost to a sense of the world of the seen. All is perishable, all is miserable, all is void,' are the words continually on his lips."

The Buddhist Cosmos teaches that worlds are born and die in endless cycles having no beginning, no end; the essential conditions of being are thought, vitality, and space; the physical elements are fire, water, earth, and air; the attributes of matter are form, sound, substance, &c. ; the qualities of living bodies are elasticity, power of aggregation and adaptation, duration, decay, change.

Its Psychology enumerates six senses, considering memory as the sixth. Six classes of Abstract Ideas, corresponding with the six senses, and fifty tendencies or faculties, such as attention, indifference, thought, reflection, memory, joy, envy, pity, love and hate, fear and rashness, doubt, faith, and delusion, &c.

Its three main theories are, the transmigration of souls, common to Brahmanism; the doctrine of Nirvana; the chain of cause and effect. The cause or antecedent of the two great evils of the world, old age and death, is sought and found to be in birth; the cause of birth is previous existence, the cause of previous existence is attachment, and of this attachment, thirst, and this is traced to sensation, and sensation is the result of the six senses. What is the cause of the six senses?-name and form, Namarupa; and the cause of Namarupa?-consciousness; and the cause of this?-concepts, imagination, the mirror, illusion; and the cause of illusion?—primitive ignorance, the root of all—the original link from which is forged the entire chain.

Its creed is summed up in a formula called the Four Great Truths. 1. Misery always accompanies existence. 2. All modes of existence, whether of men or animals, in earth or heaven, are the result of passion or desire. 3. There is no escape from existence except by the destruction of desire. 4. This can be done by following the Four Paths which lead to Nirvana. The first path, or stage, is the awakening of the soul to the truth that pain and sorrow belong to all existence. In the second stage the penitent purifies himself from all vicious desires, revengeful feelings, and delusion. In the third he becomes free from all evil passions, of ignorance, doubt, heresy, vexation, and unkindliness; and in the fourth he reaches the highest stage, where the soul is free from earthly desires and passions-a stage above purity, justice, and even faith itself, described by Buddha as the condition of universal charity. Nirvana is now within the grasp of the saintly penitent, and after this short life on earth he becomes free from all material existence, and enters the final state of rest, Nirvana.

The following are its general precepts, or rules of living:

1. One should not destroy life.

2. One should not steal.

3. One should abstain from impurity.

4. One should not lie.

5. One should abstain from intoxicating drinks.

6. One should not eat at forbidden times.

7. One should abstain from dancing, singing, music, and stage plays. 8. One should not use garlands, scents, or ornaments.

9. One should not use a high or broad bed.

10. One should not receive gold or silver.

These are the Buddhist "Ten Commandments." The first five, prohibitions to kill, steal, commit adultery, tell falsehoods, and drink, apply to all Buddhists, while the last five, the austerities, to eat no animal food, or after midday, to abstain from use of ornaments, money, a bed, and the enjoyment of dancing, apply only to those who take the vows of a religious life. A saint was allowed to possess but eight things - three cloths, serving as a garment, a girdle, a begging bowl, a strainer, needle,

and razor.

The cardinal virtues, according to this system, are six-Charity and Purity, Patience and Courage, Contemplation and Knowledge. The vices are Pride, Sensuality, Hatred, Doubt, Love of Life on Earth, Desire for Life in Heaven. Its duties are: Those of parents to children: To train them in virtue, have them taught the arts and sciences, provide them with wives and husbands, give them their inheritance. Those of children to parents: To guard their property, support them in old age, honour their memory. Those of husband to wife: To treat her with kindness, be faithful, cause her to be honoured by others, give her suitable ornaments and clothes. Those of wife to husband: To be hospitable to his friends, be chaste, be a thrifty housekeeper. Those towards friends and companions Promoting their interests, giving them presents, treating them as equals. Their duties in return: Adhesion in misfortune, offering a refuge in time of danger, guarding property, showing kindness to family. Liberality, courtesy, kindliness, unselfishness, this is the "lynch-pin of the moral chariot."

Its form of prayer :—

"There are five principal kinds of meditation, which in Buddhism takes the place of prayer. The first is a meditation on Love, in which the monk thinks of all beings and longs for happiness for each. Firstly thinking how happy he himself could be if free from all sorrow, anger, and evil desire, he is then to wish for the same happiness for others, and, lastly, to long for the welfare of his foes. Remembering their good actions only, and that in some former birth his enemy may have been his father or his friend, he must endeavour in all earnestness and truth to desire for him all the good he would seek for himself.

"The second meditation is called meditation on PITY, in which the mendicant is to think of all beings in distress, to realize as far as he can

their unhappy state, and thus awaken the sentiments of pity and sorrow over the sorrows of others.

"The third is the meditation on Joy, the converse of the last, in which he is to think on the gladness and prosperity of others, and to rejoice in their joy.

"The fourth is the meditation on IMPURITY, in which the mendicant thinks of the vileness of the body, and of the horrors of disease and corruption; how it passes away like the foam of the sea, and how, by the continued repetition of birth and death, mortals become subject to continual sorrow.

"The fifth is the meditation on SERENITY, wherein the mendicant thinks of all things that worldly men hold good or bad; power and oppression, love and hate, riches and want, fame and contempt, youth and beauty, decrepitude and disease, and regards them all with fixed indifference, with utter calmness and serenity of mind."

Its Bible, or sacred Code, is the Tri-pitaka, i.e. the three baskets, the first part containing doctrines or practical discourses of the Buddha poems, legends, folk-lore; the second the discipline of the order; the third a system of metaphysics, "On the elements," "The pairs," the causes of existence, &c. Its Holy Land embraces the provinces of Magadha and Sravasti, lying upon the course of the Ganges, midway between Delhi and Calcutta.

Its chief discipline, by which here below the most perfect happiness possible is attained, is contemplation or ecstasy, the different stages of which are thus defined. The first stage is an inward sense of happiness, born in the soul of the ascetic, when he suddenly finds within him the power to distinguish the profound nature of things; he judges and reasons still, but is freed from conditions of sin. The contemplation of Nirvana, for which he longs, throws him into an ecstasy which permits him to ascend to the second stage. Here his purity and freedom from vice remain the same, but judgment and reason are set aside, and his intelligence, now freed and fixed on Nirvana, experiences interior satisfaction, without judging or comprehending it. At the third stage even the pleasure and satisfaction disappear, a vague sense of physical wellbeing supervenes, the pleasure of previous happiness is indifferent, memory still remains, confused consciousness, notwithstanding the detachment nearly absolute to which he has attained. In the fourth and final stage the ascetic no longer feels this sense of well-being, for all feeling, sense, and knowledge, memory and consciousness are gone, he has arrived at perfect impassibility, the nearest approach on earth to the state of the blessed.

In addition to the character of the saint, we have also Buddha in the character of the sage. Like the wise men of Greece, of the same century, he has told us of some of the most difficult things in the world-being poor, to be charitable; being rich and great, to be religious; to lust, and

banish desire; to escape destiny; to be strong without being rash; to see an agreeable object without seeking to obtain it; to bear an insult without anger; to be good, and at the same time to be learned and clever.

Buddhist doctrine in time became recognized as a State religion in some parts of India. A system of dogmas was drawn up as an established code, and councils held to legalize it. The first great council was held shortly after the death of Buddha. A hundred years later a second took place, and 250 B.C. occurred the third great council under the Emperor Asoka, the Constantine of Buddhism. A number of heretical priests were expelled, schisms and disorders adjusted, and the ceremonies of the orthodox creed, which had fallen into disuse, re-established. "At this council the hitherto unwritten creed became fixed, and the decrees of former councils were modified."

Unlike Brahmanism, which held foreigners to be unworthy of its holy influence, Buddhism sought and made converts in all lands. Gradually spreading itself through India and adjacent countries, it carried the elements of Indian civilization to many savage tribes; was introduced in Ceylon shortly after the third council, and embraced by the Chinese about 65 B.C. Later it spread to Japan, Burmah, Siam, Thibet, Mongolia, and parts of Tartary and Siberia. After a time the religion split up into many sects, differing more or less from the "true church." Of these the Mahayana, established about the beginning of our era, and the Yogachara, in the sixth century A.D., are the most important.

During the eighth and ninth centuries Buddhism was driven out of India, "owing to the corruption of the priesthood and the superstitions which had crept into and demoralized the faith." In Ceylon exists a much purer form of this religion.

Wherever Buddhism has held its sway it has left a crowd of temples, monasteries, and sacred buildings containing relics of Buddha, most of which are now in ruins. Some fine examples of their rock temples exist at Ellora and on the islands of Salsette and Elephanta.

Max Müller estimates the Buddhists of the present day to number 480,000,000, about half the population of the world.